Trip to Moscow

I haven't been the best at blogging every day this trip. We've been a little busy for the past few days!  It's Saturday afternoon now and we're in Moscow, staying with an American family who works for the US Embassy.

Let me just tell you, one of the great benefits of being Mormon is that you have connections with great, clean-cut, honest people, literally anywhere you go in the world. We have had the best drivers, babysitters, and people to stay with because of my LDS connections.  We found our St. Petersburg driver, Boris, by asking someone we knew back home, who had served a two-year mission in St. Pete, if he knew of someone who could speak English and could drive for us for a reasonable price. This saved us $30 every day we used him (whenever our coordinator didn't require us to use hers) The Nine's used Boris, and so will the families who are coming in the coming weeks.  Anyway, Boris was away on a vacation while we were here this time. So he lined us up with his friend, Alex, (pictured with us above) who was also such a sweetheart and spoke English very well.  It was so fun getting to know him all those tedious hours in the heavy city traffic.

Before we came for this trip, we knew that it would be challenging to take our newly-adopted children to the passport agency, since we would have to wait in line for several hours in a crowded room. (Usually one spouse stays with the child so the other can go do this, but ours are not here!)  So... Boris lined us up with Olga, a cute church member and University student who lives near our apartment.  She was adorable with the kids and spoke a little English, which was very helpful to us!  We loved Olga and she looooved Anya and Vahnya.


As soon as we had the kids' passports, we dropped of our coordinator, Elena (pictured below,) went back to our apartment and packed our suitcases for Moscow.  That evening, Alex picked up Elena and brought her to our apartment to help us get to our train.

It was bitter sweet saying goodbye to Elena. She had worked hours and hours to make sure that our babies could come home with us.  Her job is controversial here because many people frown upon foreigners adopting their children.  (That's a whole discussion in itself...) Anyway, as grateful as we are for everything she does, her particular personality didn't always blend with our casual, American ways so we had our moments. We were ready to part ways on both ends!  But at the same time, a little sad.  Kind of hard to explain.  It takes a special person to do this tedious, stressful work day after day.   We admire her for her devotion to her work. She truly cares for these children and will do whatever she has to do to make sure they come home to their families. 

I

The train station was right at the end of our block! So Alex brought a friend over to help us transport our  huge suitcases and our bags. Elena came to help, as well. We needed all six of us to carry everything plus the kids.  But we boarded, hugged Elena and Alex goodbye and got all settled in our little spot.  Thank goodness Katrina had a little point and shoot camera in her pocket. She got some good action shots for us.

Anya was pretty excited about the whole adventure. 

I was thinking, "Oh boy, this is going to be a long four hours!

Once again....DVD's to the RESCUE!  Yeah.  They were glued.

 Two hours later...9:30 pm

Anya was glued to that little DVD player the whole time. I worried her eyeballs would fall out of her head. :) At about 10:00, I tried turning it off and getting her to fall asleep. Nope, not gonna have that.  Back on it went. Oh well, whatever works!

Our agency's Moscow coordinator came right in to our train car and found us right when we arrived. Her husband lugged our heavy bags for us and we made it to their car.  We piled in and they took us to a little apartment that's next door to the US Embassy.

Definately nothing as nice as our St. Pete apartment.  And just as much money! We decided we would only stay there one night.

 Here's the view from the apartment. Hellooo Moscow! It was loud there.  Good thing it was 1:30 am when we finally went to bed, so we were nice and tired!

At 6:00 that morning, the doorbell rang. It was the doctor who works for the Embassy, here to do the kids' medical exams.  We had to wake them up and strip them down after only four hours sleep!  They were amazingly cooperative through it all (or at least Anya was, hee hee) and they went right back to sleep after he left. Anya was wiped out!  I liked how our sheets matched her p.j's. Cute, huh?

After the kids woke up, we hung around the old rickety apartment for a few hours and waited to hear from my new American friends, the Titus', who had offered to have us come stay with them while we're here in Moscow. The husband, Jeff works at the US Embassy. (Again, friends of friends, and members of our church.) They have three cute boys and they live in a beautiful American-style, sort of mountain-resort-ish community just outside of town. We'll be here until we leave either Tuesday or Wednesday.  They have been amazing hosts.  We are so grateful. They are saving us a lot of money and a LOT of headache. Anya and Vahnya love having buddies to play with, too!

Here are the cuties on the way from the apartment to the Titus' home.  All bundled up, in seat belts for the first time in their lives and happy as can be!

 

 

 Wow, that took a while to post!  Sorry for the "travel log." This blog is a record of this whole journey for us to print into a book so we'll remember as much of it as possible. I'm trying to get in as many details as possible without completely boring everyone. :)

Today and tomorrow are real relaxing, low-key days. Tomorrow, Jeremy and Mike will be here to help us get home. Monday is our Embassy appointment and our agency will file our papers at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. We're really hoping she will be able to file Monday so we can fly home on Tuesday!  We're planning to go visit Red Square that day, as well. 

I miss my kids terribly and can not WAIT to see them again.  And the best news is that we'll get to see more of our 9 year old (tomorrow!) son, Max's play performances than we thought.  His school is doing The King and I and he's one of the Asian school children. His sister dyed his hair black for the whole affair.  He's normally a blondie, so it'll be funny seeing him when we come off the airplane.  I'm so excited for everyone to meet Anya. They are going to love her!  She's great entertainment. Life will never be dull with her in our family. Bring on the fun!